Drugs as Escape or as Facilitators?

When the offender who uses drugs explains
why, he is likely to speak in terms of "escape". And the professional
literature speaks of drugs as escape from a variety of situations -- e.g., the
soul-searing environment in which the person lives, a dysfunctional family, and
so forth. The fact is that many people would like to escape any number of adversities,
but they do not use drugs. They deal with adversity in a variety of ways including
meeting it head on and trying to surmount it. What is the drug-using criminal
escaping? A hard day at the office? Studying four hours for an exam? When you
probe, you find that what he is in fact "escaping" is facing the obligations
and problems that exist in life. He uses drugs in search of something he wants,
not escape. For the criminal who uses drugs, he seeks mainly more exciting crimes,
sexual conquests, or an enhanced sense of power and control. Of course, if he
is despondent, drugs may actually be an incentive to end that state of mind by
taking his own life -- drugs as facilitators of suicide. More likely, however,
if he is feeling down, relief is only a swallow, an injection, or a snort away
and he goes in search of excitement through crime, sex, or exercising control
over other people. The point, then, is that, rather than offering escape, drugs
are facilitators of whatever the criminal wants. It is only after the fact, when
held accountable by others, that he sounds the "escape" theme.